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After the Storm Bemidji, Minn   Driving into the town, I went past hundreds of trees  bent or broken. The hurricane winds had taken down the weakest ones easily, strong ones too.   Later, I’d find …

The following is a journal of observations and reflections from a canoe trip through the northern section of Quetico Provincial Park in Ontario. Together with the Boundary Waters of Minnesota, it f…

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Book review of Steven Richard Smith’s, “The Boys of Rubber City.”

Leo is a good player, skilled in translating raindrops that boil on the Detroit River while fishing into metaphors, a man who accepts his setbacks and those of his friends with reverence and respec…

A Review by sumaiya matin November 18, 2025

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“The mass grave is a grave of names”                                              – Joy Harjo I saw you referenced on the map, something new I had not seen before, and so I drove to you, exploring …

The turning of things into another type of themselves; the moment of transition, which is endless and always coming, never done; the churning, changing, momentous repositioning of a person from one…

&…

Oddest & Oldest & Saddest & Best (Orison Books, 2026) is Michigan author Jane Zwart’s debut book of poetry. A professor of English at Calvin University and faculty fellow of the Calvin …

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I didn’t stop cause I wanted to, it wasn’t some planned thing,  well, maybe the sun was dead   set on its planned time to retreat,  and I respected the threats of glint   off the hood of my bronze …

In understanding generational change within a place like Toronto, an overly nostalgic attitude should be avoided. The older generations often look at the changes happening in front of them, feel di…

Interview with Michael Gray about The Space Between Now and Then  Michael Gray appears on Zoom idly strumming a guitar, which he proceeds to hold throughout the course of the hour-long conversation…

The Moon & Other Metaphors The moon is a woman I used to sleep with, Always white, and an icy light would Fall full on the birch forest that is A chalk stroke tally of our nights together. I re…

This morning I made my way down to a beach to make coffee. The view of this new expanse of blue looks like the one I’m used to—if anything it looks smaller. I question if I actually drove all the w…

On an Inland Sea: Writing the Great Lakes (Michael Welch, editor) Belt Publishing, 2026 Ridge Avenue runs through Chicago and the suburb of Evanston, a slight high point sloping down toward Lake Mi…

On the Island (After John M. Synge: general knowledge of time depends…on the direction of the wind)   Does it not mire us in muggy mess? Send squelching rains? Or sweep crisp clearing skies bl…

On the Island (After John M. Synge: general knowledge of time depends…on the direction of the wind)   Does it not mire us in muggy mess? Send squelching rains? Or sweep crisp clearing skies bl…

Bernie Wolski snapped the broom handle into the holder that hung just inside the tiny closet with the other cleaning supplies. No need to get out the bucket and mop. This was his last sweeping. The…

They were five soon-to-be former law students partying on Lake Michigan near the Port of Chicago. Barry and his friends had passed their exams and stood facing a jobless economy. Both everything an…

In her collection Close to a Flame, Colleen Alles demonstrates that not much out of the ordinary must happen in a story for it to be good. The reader addicted to excess might find these stories sta…

I glance out across the water as you say,  “Look, you can almost see the US.” I answer, “Do I have to?” fearing that my gaze might  receive a tariff. I mean no ill will to any person   on the …

it was a slow drip the way the joy of summer  drained from me  a hole pierced through the ceiling  of the home we’ve made  a leak which left too many spilled tears  sopped up by this worn carpet  s…

The edges of everything wave, big bluestem slanting westward toward lake, toward sun.   In the morning quiet, a covey of cranes hover over corn, an expedition, their rattled whoops   deep and raw—f…

Where the trees burn gold in October and the lakes remember everything. Where winters are long and spring arrives slowly, as if testing the ground to see if it’s ready to forgive. This is a place o…